There in Spirit
by AllSpiffyAndStuff
Summary: [Amateur Surgeon fic] Bradley makes a friend within the clinic. Unfortunately, he isn't exactly alive. [Set vaguely after game four, highly headcanon-based. Warning for discussion of trauma.]


"...I haven't actually - told anyone. Since - you know. It's a little...Weird?" Pause. "Of course, um, my grandpa would probably...Think it's pretty cool..."

Speak of the devil.

The door to the clinic's rarely used waiting room opened, and Alan Probe stuck his head through. "What are you doing in here? C'mon, you gotta see this! Bleed II's got a guy open - there's authentic vinyls in there! This guy's _really_ gotten into the music. Or...The...Other way 'round, hah! Ooh, y'think I can keep 'em afterward?"

His grandson, Bradley, meekly laughed. He pushed a half-full coffee mug slightly to the side, looking over at...Nothing. "I-I'll be back in a second," He promised in a mutter before getting off of the dingy sofa and coming up beside his grandfather. Alan beamed, and the two of them made their way to one of the surgery rooms.

"Who were y'talking to, anyway?" Alan asked.

Bradley looked away, hands beginning to wring his red cravat. "Oh - nobody. M-myself."

"Heh, just like your old man! I talk to myself all the time! 'Course, I can never tell what's just me filling air and what's plot exposition..."

* * *

True to his word, Bradley eventually came back into the waiting room, wringing his cravat yet again. He made his way back over to the sofa, sitting down, picking up his coffee mug. His coffee had gone cold, and he sighed, putting the mug down and pushing it away. He looked around. "Wh - where did you go?" He asked, his hands now beginning to pick at his fingernails, as though they were unable to keep still at all. "You're still - are you still here?"

"I don't have many other places to be."

Bradley blinked a few times, looking over. There was a hazy sort of shimmer in the air, and as he blinked, an image seemed to come into focus. It was a man, an older man. Messy hair, sloppily shaven, square eyeglasses with a small crack in the corner. Bradley could almost make out a logo on his doctor's coat - a pizza cutter over a mass of bloody intestines. An all too familiar logo indeed. The specter gave a smirk at Bradley's slightly surprised and slightly relieved expression. "You didn't honestly think I would leave, did you?"

"...Maybe..." Bradley admitted. He abruptly seemed to remember something, and he felt around his vest a bit before pulling out a purple cough syrup bottle. With a smile, he set it on the coffee table. "Ah, there you go! It was...The only one I could find..."

The ghost observed the bottle for a moment, then picked it up, turning it over in his hands. "Cherry next time," He said (to which Bradley nodded rapidly a few times), but he still put on a smile. "Alan does the restocking, I take it?"

"Yes. Well - most of the time."

"He remembered my preferred brand." He laughed slightly, his voice taking on a sort of wistful undertone. "...Somehow, it always startles me, how much he...Cared about me."

A pause. Bradley let out a short laugh, hands wringing. "You - still mean a lot to him. Great teacher, master surgeon...Best friend." His shoulders fell. "I wish I could have met you, too." His eyes went wide, and he looked back to the ghost, waving his hands in a panic. "N-not that meeting you now is bad! But my grandfather kn-knew you before, and so did Ophelia, and - well, maybe not -" He sighed, slumping down a bit, closing his eyes. "Sorry. I-I blew it."

"Not at all! I hardly know how you would blow a conversation with a ghost...I never had one myself."

That made Bradley relax, opening his eyes, smiling again. Doctor Ignacious Bleed really was as nice as all of Ophelia's and Alan's stories made him out to be - even now that he was dead.

* * *

"How long have you been able to speak to the dead, exactly?"

Granted, not even the most enthusiastic stories about Doctor Bleed from Ophelia or Alan could prepare Bradley for his...Passionate interest in Bradley's little talent. Bradley scratched behind an ear, thinking. "Since..._Always_?" He replied, then laughed to himself. "I-I, uh, um. I don't exactly talk to them a lot, since, you know. People would ask questions, and I don't really know how to answer them..." He exhaled, hand lowering. "But...I think it was since always."

"Fascinating," Bleed said with a smile. He began to reach into his coat pocket for something to take notes with - but all too soon realized how futile that would be, and his hands stopped. "You know, I _had_ been looking into the supernatural to see if their abilities could be of any benefit to the greater surgical community...Though I...Never was able to find such creatures for myself." Pause. "...And then I met Alan, and we proceeded to operate on a superhero...And a robot...And a car." Another pause. His eyes rolled away, and he began to tick off on his fingers. "Then he proceeds to encounter a vampire...My grandniece operates on a mutated bear, does that count?...A few more robots...Isn't one of the hospital workers a demon?...The Polymorph! Can't forget about them, hardly..." He took a glance at his fingers, then looked back to Bradley, hands lowering. "A lot, is my point. Has your grandfather always been something of a...Weirdness magnet?"

Bradley beamed. "As long as I've known him!" Bradley's eyes suddenly lit up, and he straightened up, clasping his hands. "Do - do you think my - my seeing ghosts is a...Sort of lesser genetic manifestation of that? I-I guess that would make sense, I could see it being a sort of useful quirk in a different game where I was the star...Th-though I don't think I'd make a particularly good star of a game, I'm more of a...Supporting character..."

"..._Game_?" Bleed asked, head tilted, eyebrow quirked. "What are you talking about?"

Bradley looked off to the side, staring at nothing.

"Who are you _looking_ at!?" Bleed asked, slightly more exasperated.

"...Nobody," He said, closing his eyes and shaking his head. He pulled into himself slightly. "Um...I-I think I...Got that from my grandfather as well."

Bleed sighed, shaking his head. Genetics could bring about the strangest things.

* * *

Genetics truly _could_ bring about the strangest things, Bleed found himself thinking again soon enough.

"And I - I swear he went _graverobbing_!" Bradley's voice was in a panic, his hands gesticulating all over the place as he paced around the waiting room. "D-digging up bodies and sewing them together and - and trying to make it _live_!" For emphasis, his arms waved around. He didn't even seem to realize he was sweating, working himself up in nearly comical alarm. "I don't know why! Much less in _broad daylight_ in the _middle of the afternoon_! Oph-Ophelia tried to explain the, the -" He made a few more gestures to try and communicate what his tongue seemingly couldn't, "The cloning - genetic - with the -" Bradley let out a frustrated sigh, running a hand down his face, and then shaking it off when he finally realized he was sweating. He looked over to the sofa, where Bleed leaned against the arm, seemingly trying to make sense of just about anything Bradley was going on about. Bradley tried to calm himself as he asked. "You wouldn't - do - something like - that, would you?"

"Goodness no," Bleed said, shaking his head, waving off the idea with a hand. "I fancy myself a respectable surgeon, not a modern Prometheus."

Bradley let out a breath. He pinched the bridge of his nose, shaking his head. "Th-then it must be since he's part..." He seemed unable to force out the name, so he swapped it for "Supervillain," which still communicated the correct idea. He walked over to the sofa and flopped down onto it, exhausted from his tirade. "...Am I making any sense?" He asked, turning his head to look at the ghost. "You...You know Bleed II, right?"

Bleed shrugged. "I know of him, yes," He replied, "But I think he has enough issues with his identity and creation without me showing up and...Literally displaying to him who he is meant to be."

That made enough sense. Still, Bradley sunk into the sofa, shutting his eyes and sighing. "I like him, I do, he's very nice, but..." His hands began to wring. "I...I don't like it when he does things like that."

"Well, I wouldn't either. Unless, of course, he learns from Victor Frankenstein's mistakes and treats his monster like the proper child it is."

Bradley sat up bolt-straight, eyes wide, sputtering in panic.

Bleed covered his mouth with a hand, looking away as he began to laugh. "Only joking!" He said between laughs, which made Bradley relax a bit, though he still curled his hands into fists. It took a moment for the ex-surgeon to stop chuckling, but he did soon enough. "P-perhaps get him involved in...Crosswords, something else stimulating. I cannot speak for the sway his other DNA has on him, but I know I would have appreciated it."

"Crosswords," Bradley muttered, then pulled a small notepad and a pen from his vest, scribbling that down.

Bleed blinked in surprise. "Have you always had that on you?"

He nodded rapidly a few times. "E-ever since I started working in politics!"

The ghost nodded back, humming. He never did hear much about Bradley's time in politics, and for a moment, he wondered why that was.

* * *

"...Could you tell me about...Your student?"

"I should think you know plenty about your grandfath -"

"N-no, I mean, the..." Bradley bit at his thumbnail, further chipping his yellow nail polish. His eyes flicked away. "The one before him."

Bleed paused, realizing who he meant. His shoulders fell as he exhaled, eyes wandering away as well. "...I used to think of him as a...Brilliant young man." He sunk back into the sofa - sort of literally. "He cared a lot more about how he looked back then. Always clean. Professional. Very well-spoken. He didn't smile much, but he was sharp as a tack, and...And I truly thought we were excellent partners. Perhaps even friends." He didn't notice Bradley shift away slightly, seeming to pull into himself. "Naturally that...All changed when I saw Dwayne's...True colors." Bleed pushed up his glasses, his eyes seeming to go far away. "I'd thought him dead, or so disgusted with me that he never wanted to see me again...But seeing him in the old hospital, under the dingy lights, as he...Stabbed me with his needle...I was an idiot for not seeing it sooner." Another pause, this one lasting all too long. "Why do you ask?" Bleed finished, looking back towards -

Bradley had his arms crossed over his chest protectively. His legs were pulled up on to the sofa, and he was as curled up as he could be.

He was crying.

"I-I'm sorry!" Bleed stammered out, panicked. He came a little bit closer to Bradley, then instantly hesitated. "I-I must have been getting ahead of myself, I was hardly paying attention - I truly didn't mean to upset -"

"He almost killed you," He could just barely make out Bradley whine between his tears.

"Yes, well - it's hardly an issue now, considering -" He gestured to himself, as though his point should be obvious. His tone softened. "Did something - did he...?"

"He almost killed you," Bradley repeated. He pulled into himself tighter, his arms squeezing against himself harder, fingers curling against his vest. "He - he almost killed me -" Before Bleed could say anything, Bradley drew in a shuddering breath and explained in a tumble of words: "I-I just wanted everyone to be happy, so I got a political internship and the president wanted me as his aide, I was so - and he could be a bit sour and rough around the edges but, but I thought he - he could be nice when he wanted to be - Alan fixed him - and he wanted me to - to shoot -" Another shuddering inhale, "I couldn't - I-I told him, I told him h-he was my gr-grandpa, and - and that my real name wasn't 'Bradley Price', it was -" Swallow, and then he seemed to sort of gasp for air, "He sl-slipped s-something into my coffee, I know he did, but I didn't know then, an' - an' when I c-couldn't fight back, I was so hazy, he - he -" His hands gripped even harder on his vest. He began sobbing all the more, head lowering, body trembling.

Bleed was silent. He stared at the young man, fixated on his hands, on how hard he was clutching his chest. He pulled back his own doctor's coat, seeing the hole in his shirt, and below it, his own exposed ribcage. His face became deadly serious for a moment. "To think he would..." He began to murmur, then shook his head. He pulled his coat shut. Then he got off of the sofa and seemed to vanish for a moment.

Bradley was alone, though he hardly realized it; too deeply wrapped up in his own sobs and the memory of the president beating him so close to death to notice much of anything. Then something lightly fell against his side, brushing his hand, and that pulled him out of it. He sniffled, opening up his eyes, slowly looking over. It was that purple cough syrup bottle, leaning against him. Confused, he picked it up, clutching it in his shaking hands. He shifted on the sofa. He looked up. There was Bleed, floating a bit away from him (physically inside the coffee table), hands behind his back. "I don't advise you fall into the bad habit I used as a coping mechanism," He said with a slight smile, "But if nothing else I supposed having something to hold could ground you in the present."

For a long moment, Bradley just sat there, squeezing the cough syrup bottle in his hands, trying to breathe. He wiped his nose on his sleeve, looking away from the ghost. Bleed sighed. "You...Haven't talked about this much to anyone else - have you?"

He shook his head. "N...Nobody wants t-to see me cry...I only matter if I-I'm useful, th-that's -"

"...That's what Dwayne led you to believe."

Bradley went deathly quiet.

Softly, Bleed came a little bit closer. Bradley hardly reacted. The ghost sat down next to him, but his eyes couldn't meet his face. An exhale. Then, "You couldn't have stopped him, Bradley."

"But I should have -"

"You couldn't have. I was his teacher, Bradley. And I couldn't stop him from...The things he did. How could anyone ever expect you to?"

Bradley let out a shuddering breath. His hands fidgited with the child-proof cap on the cough syrup bottle. Then he wiped his eyes and attempted to relax a bit. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I understand."

And without a shadow of a doubt, Bradley believed Bleed was telling the truth.

* * *

"He calls himself a _falconer_?" Bleed II said with noticable contempt as he stapled together another beak-inflicted wound on his patient. "I hardly believe _that_."

"He works at a renaissance faire," Alan said, smiling to himself. "Nobody there's a 'real' anything! Well, 'cept the jesters - I absolutely believe they're real idiots!"

Bleed II yanked out the lighter, though paused before he could flick it alight. "Does your coulrophobia extend to jesters?"

"Colorado..."

"Layman's terms: fear of clowns."

"Oh! Nah, they're fine. Mimes are a solid fifty-fifty."

Bleed II nodded (hardly understanding, though that was oftentimes typical when talking to Alan), flicking the lighter alight to begin cauterizing.

From behind both of them, Bradley watched, eyes sweeping over the body of the patient. He tilted his head slightly. "Don't forget the talon marks by the neck," He remarked, gesturing his head towards the wound.

Bleed II smeared Pain-Away Gel on the patient with one hand and shifted the patient's body with the other, frowning as he noticed the gashes. "Good eye," He said, capping the gel bottle and sticking it in his suit pocket. "Lovely that you decided to join us, even if it was a bit short notice..."

Bradley stuck his hands into the pockets of his pants. "I...Didn't realize I'd be joining you until recently."

"Glad you did. We really don't talk as much as we should." Staple, cauterize, gel. Bleed II felt around himself a bit before yanking out the scanner. "You're getting better at handling me knocking the patient out with a bat."

Bradley's eyes darted away, hands beginning to fidget - but he closed his eyes and breathed a bit before laughing slightly. "Well, it's...Certainly _effective_..."

"The bat's pretty smart," Alan nodded a few times. "Y'know, back when I started, I just clobbered 'em with whatever was around. Bricks, pool cues, the back end of the chainsaw..."

"How you managed to avoid goring your own hands open, I'll never know," Bradley murmured just under his breath, looking down.

The scanner pinged, and Bleed II sliced some skin open. "I should hope I never get so desperate as to do something like that."

"Hey, everything _about_ this business was desperate! Literally founded on desperately putting the doc's ribs back together!" Alan beamed, and Bradley took his hands out of his pockets, crossing his arms over his own ribcage protectively. "I like to see it as part of the Bleed Everywhere charm."

"That...Is no way to run an actual clinic."

"Heh, that's what the doc used to tell me when we were setting up! But the two of us sure proved that wrong!"

Bradley chuckled. "Yes, I...Was rather impressed by the scale we achieved."

Awkwardly, Bleed II pulled a thick leather glove from the patient. "How did that even...?" He began to ask himself, then shook his head. The first rule of amateur surgery was not to ask too many questions. He carefully set it on a tray, then got to work finishing up. "I hope this new clinic is just as impressive, then?"

"Of course!" Alan was grinning wide, and he affectionally punched Bleed II's shoulder (causing him to fumble with the stapler a bit). "It's like you were _made_ for this stuff!"

"...Quite literally, yes, I was."

Alan paused, then laughed to himself. "Always forget that part!"

Bradley found himself laughing alongside his grandfather. He paused, exhaling. "It is...Rather impressive, indeed." He relaxed slightly. "I'm...Proud of all you've managed to achieve. And on such short notice."

"It's amazing what you can do when you can relive memories!" Alan agreed.

Bleed II blushed in embarrassment, backing away from the patient. "Yes, well...Let's hope this isn't all I'm good for," He said. He examined the body for a moment - everything looked just about right - then looked back towards Bradley with a slightly crained eyebrow. "You're far less nervous than usual. And I've hardly ever heard you so...Wistful about surgery. Something change?"

For a moment, Bradley flushed. He began nervously sweating, hands playing with his cravat. "Er - w-well, I mean -" But then he closed his eyes, drew in a breath, went still, and put on a smile. "Would you excuse me for a moment?" He asked, then darted out of the surgery room.

He only paused when he was in a far enough hallway from them, and he stood for a moment, just collecting his breath. Bradley closed his eyes, bit his tongue, began picking at his nails. When he opened his eyes again, the ghost of Bleed was hovering beside him, holding his head and looking a little discombobulated. "...Apologies," The ghost said, smiling a bit in embarrassment. "I...Never said I was a particularly good actor."

Bradley let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding, then waved off the apology. "No, it - it's fine. Really." The smile of his own indicated he was being honest, not just nice. "Was it nice?"

"It was! I'm thrilled I was able to see them in action. It was...Just like the old days." His smile became nostalgic, but it didn't last, his head shaking and his attention going back to Bradley. "Are you alright?"

He nodded. "It, well...It was nice. Not...Shaking so much. Maybe soon I'll be able to do that without...Help."

"I'm certain you will. I'll always be there to help you through. Although perhaps with less...Actual spiritual possession. It's far too disorienting. And I'm not exactly a very convincing Bradley."

Bradley smiled at the ghost. "Well, I wouldn't be much of a good Bleed, so...I-I guess we're even."

Bleed smiled back, and perhaps would have said something else -

"Bradley!" Alan shouted, rushing into the hall. Bradley let out a surprised yelp, jumping back. "Sorry about that, but - Bleed II can't actually find this guy's falcon, and I don't really want to make that sound bad, but if its loose in the clinic, I do _not_ want it getting killed, you understand? This place doesn't have the funds to buy a whole new falcon! And I do not have the self restraint to not buy a falcon for myself."

Bradley nodded a few times rapidly, and then the two split up, scampering down different ends of the hall in order to search for the missing falcon.

Bleed shook his head, but smiled wide.

Some things really never changed.


End file.
